Norwegian driver avoids moose only to hit bear

A Norwegian driver swerved his car on a rural road to avoid running into a moose, only to hit a bear instead.

The driver escaped uninjured while his car suffered some damagePhoto: Alamy

3:10PM BST 16 Aug 2012

The driver spotted the moose on a country road near Hanestad, 139 miles north of Oslo, around midnight on Wednesday, and tried to go around the animal, not realising that a bear was also nearby.

"The driver had lost a bit of speed as he tried to avoid the moose before hitting the bear," said Svein Erik Bjorke of the local wildlife authority, who was out in the forest searching for the wounded animal.

"We are currently tracking the bear and we have found traces of blood indicating internal injuries," he said.

The driver escaped uninjured while his car suffered some damage.

Norway's rugged mountains are sparsely populated and full of wildlife. The country, nearly the size of Germany but home to just five million people, has around 100,000 moose and 150 brown bears, authorities said.